Microsoft’s 10th licensing agreement with Compal means it has patent deals with more than half of Android vendors. Does this mean it is becoming a patent troll?

In a blog post last week, the company's general counsel Brad Smith and deputy general counsel Horacio Gutierrez indicated that it has signed 1,133 patent licence agreements.

Microsoft also has spent $4.5 billion licensing patents of other companies.

"These ensure that if our software infringes someone else's patents, we'll address the problem rather than leave it to others," wrote Smith and Gutierrez.

But many user-comments on the post were less than enthused, and several (of the 97 as of press time) accused the company of preferring litigation over innovation.

To find out whether Microsoft, which declined to comment on this story, was exhibiting troll-like behaviour or simply using smart business strategy, Managing IP posed the question to lawyers and law professors.